The new mainstream flagship is the GeForce 8600 GTS, which takes the spot previously held by the GeForce 7900 GS. NVIDIA slots the GeForce 8600 GTS below the GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB, which currently occupies the $299-$329 price points. GeForce 8600 GTS based products fill in the $199-229 price points. GeForce 8600 GTS-based products feature 32-stream processors clocked at 1.45 GHz. NVIDIA has set the reference core and memory clock speeds at 675 MHz and 1.0 GHz, respectively.

Catering to the $149-159 price points is the slightly detuned GeForce 8600 GT. GeForce 8600 GT-based products feature 32-stream processors as with the GeForce 8600 GTS; however, NVIDIA detunes the shader clock down to 1.18 GHz. Reference core and memory clock speeds are set at 540 MHz and 700 MHz, respectively. NVIDIA slots the GeForce 8500 GT at the bottom of its new mainstream product lineup. The new GeForce 8500 GT fills in the $89-$129 price points with its 16-stream processors. NVIDIA clocks the 16-stream processors at 900 MHz on the value-oriented offering. Reference core and memory clock speeds of the GeForce 8500 GT are 450 MHz and 400 MHz, respectively.

NVIDIA does not integrate HDCP support for its GeForce 8600 and 8500 products. Add-in board manufacturers will have to purchase external EEPROMs with HDCP keys. Expect GeForce 8600 GTS-based products to all have HDCP support. NVIDIA does not require HDCP support on GeForce 8600 GT and 8500 GT based products. Manufacturers are free to include or exclude the feature at their own discretion.

This could still be an issue with Vista since all manufacturers are having issues with performance. Microsoft changed a bunch of things which was the same problem we had moving from Windows 98 to Windows XP. It is just going to take time and usually going to take game developers to changed the way the game interacts with the video card.

Not everyone has the extra money to spend on the top of the line cards, but DX10 cards available in everyone's price range will generate more sales than updating drivers for early adopters to a new operating system. Plus I'm sure that Nvidia has multiple teams running that have different tasks. One for hardware development and another for Software/Driver development.

Not everyone has the extra money to spend on the top of the line cards, but DX9 cards available in everyone's price range will generate more sales than updating drivers for early adopters to a new operating system. Plus I'm sure that Nvidia has multiple teams running that have different tasks. One for hardware development and another for Software/Driver development.

See what the change was? *points to DX9*

Does anyone remember those great "first to market before the drivers were finished" DX9 cards were?

Anyone?

Anyone?

Why the now "infamous" "FX" cards... namely the 5200, 5600 and 5800 cards that were perhaps the very worst cards Nvidia ever produced. Also remember that the FX cards actually ran the then current DX8 code very well but when real DX9 games came out the fireworks began.

While I'm not saying that the 8xxx cards will be a bust in DX10 the similarities are interesting. The 8xxx's run DX9 code very well and the new drivers are late, lacking and untested in real DX10 games.

After the last incident I am no longer taking Nvidia's word for it that they will be killer DX10 cards. I'll wait and see once real DX10 games come out and not some DX9 games with minor DX10 "hacks" added.